Authors: R.J. Lewis
BORDEN 2
Copyright ©2015 R.J. Lewis. All rights reserved.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, place, events, and other elements portrayed herein are either the product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to real persons or events is coincidental.
The setting of this story is completely fake, derived purely from the imagination of the author.
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photography, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system without the prior consent from the publisher and author, except in the instance of quotes for reviews. No part of this book may be uploaded without the permission of the publisher and author, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is originally published.
Borden
I thought we made it clear never to bring another person close to you again. We’ll get her, Mr Borden, and you will never find me. You will only think you have. But I’m smoke. I scatter and disappear. You cannot find me.
“So that’s how we’re going to play,” Borden murmured at the cell phone screen.
He slipped out of the bed and silently moved to the window. He peered through the blinds and scanned the deserted streets. At this point, all feeling associated with that text hadn’t hit him. He was calm and cool, not a single part of him threatened or afraid. This was the only way he could function with fucked up situations like this. The second he let it into his heart, he would be doomed, and with that god awful text threatening the life of Emma, he was working particularly hard not to let it get to him.
Fuck, if he let it get to him, he’d trash the room in a fit.
He stared out for some time, holding his breath, waiting for a sign of something –
anything
– suspicious. The world was still. The occasional car drove down the street, offering a bit of light before fading away. Sometime after that, a group of men drunkenly walked along the sidewalk, laughing through their slurred speech.
Then…silence again.
The silence was a bitch of a thing and Borden didn’t like it.
He moved away, glancing over his shoulder at Emma’s still frame, before leaving the bedroom. He went to the living room window and looked out again. With his mind firing out crazy possibilities, his gaze lingered on a dark alleyway between two apartment buildings.
Borden scoffed to himself just then. Was it possible somebody was there now? Was the fucker behind the message that stupidly brazen?
The piece of shit didn’t realize how far Borden had come, how hard he had worked and what he lost in the process. He didn’t know that Borden went through hell, tasted the flames, and burned himself inside and out just to be where he was. And now the fucker might be insulting his intelligence. No, he
was
insulting his intelligence by sending him a text to begin with.
He stared at the alleyway harder. It was the perfect spot for someone to be in if they wanted to catch a glimpse. Was there somebody there now? Thinking one step ahead was what Borden excelled at, and in his mind, logic told him there was.
Or was he paranoid?
His logic lately had been muddled. It’d been disrupted and torn apart piece by piece all thanks to the soft little body feet away from him.
Borden shook his head just then, trying to rationalize this. Whoever sent the text was just messing with him…and yet he couldn’t help but feel like there was a sliver of seriousness about it. That ignored paranoia was what killed Kate. With all his new wealth, he’d felt untouchable back then, and at the moment, with the city bending to his will, he was getting too comfortable.
He wasn’t untouchable. He would never be, and he would never disillusion himself by thinking he was again. Bad things always found a way in, no matter how many steps ahead you were, and it was that thought alone that gave him a twisted feeling from within. Shit, it felt like his insides seized. He tried to block it out. Feelings at a time like this weren’t going to solve the problem, but fuck, he pictured Emma hurt and afraid, and that twisted feeling grew hotter inside of him. He glanced down at his hands. Tremors ran down his arms and to the tips of his fingers.
Shit. Shit.
Borden returned to the bedroom and sat down on the edge of the bed. He shut his eyes and breathed.
Calm the fuck down.
Calm the fuck down.
He thirsted for the blood of the maggot that thought he could get away with this. Borden couldn’t disintegrate right now, although every inch of him was blazing with the need to turn this city apart for answers. He was being impulsive. He needed to think first and act later. Yeah, that was exactly what he needed to do. The violence would have to wait.
He turned his head to Emma and watched her for some time. Breathing lightly, her lips were parted, strands of her black hair over parts of her face. Fucking stunning, his little firecracker. Slowly the anger within him disappeared and his hands no longer shook. Always she had this affect on him. Always she managed to cool the burn within him with just one look at her. She did something to him he didn’t fully understand. She made everything bearable.
Staring at her sprawled out in a peaceful slumber, all perfect and sweet, Borden knew he had no right to want her. But he made no apologies for it either. He was being selfish on purpose. Any compassionate person could see it was wrong. A good man would have realized she deserved better. A good man would have let her go to live her life to the fullest.
Only Borden was, by definition,
not
a good man. He knew she deserved better. He just didn’t give a fuck. By having Emma, he was putting her in harm’s way and yet… the thought of doing the right thing – of letting her go just hours after she’d given herself to him – was unfathomable. There wasn’t a single part of his being that would allow that to happen.
He couldn’t do it.
He just…couldn’t.
The selfish prick that he was felt assured by that simple fact. Even if it meant locking her away just to have her, he would do it. His want for her ran dangerously deep; it would frighten people the extent he would go just to keep her. And that’s all he wanted to do. Keep her. She wasn’t going anywhere, and that text…well, it was full of shit.
It had to be.
Pulling out his zippo lighter, he rested his back against the headboard of the bed and twirled it between his fingers. With his other hand, he grabbed one of Emma’s infinite switchblades off the night table and opened it. He stared at the cheap blade, running his thumb along the dull end of it. He suppressed a smile at her ridiculous attempt at arming herself. It was akin to arming a gorgeous butterfly with a machete.
Just… adorable.
So pathetically, indescribably adorable.
That prompted him to glimpse at her again. He couldn’t help it. Dropping the knife, he lightly ran his fingers down her body, over the soft curves of her warm skin. He felt a stir of desire. If he wasn’t thinking so much about that damned message, he might have hardened again. He might have forced her awake with his cock between her lips. Might have taken her again, this time nothing like tonight’s soft lovemaking. He would have
fucked
her, and she would have writhed beneath him wanting every second of it. She would have moaned in his ear, clawed at his scalp, hurt him ‘til his dick throbbed harder, and she would have loved every single second of it. Because that’s what Emma was: hungry and twisted like him, selfish and hard like him. It only took him fucking up her life to realize it.
Now is not the time for fucking.
He listened to every bit of noise as he admired her, idly watching the minutes tick with this dread growing inside of him. In his need to see her, nobody but Graeme knew he was here. He didn’t even have a fucking gun on him.
He was suddenly disturbed by how vulnerable he was. He was the most feared man in New Raven, and the fucking idiot was sitting inside a dilapidated apartment building, unarmed, unprepared, and with a woman he cared for sleeping right next to him.
Brilliant, dickhead. Absolutely brilliant.
And all he could think about was that alleyway.
It took him ten minutes. Exactly ten agonizing minutes before he pulled his cell phone out and messaged Graeme.
You around?
Of course he was around. That man never slept. It took not even a minute for Graeme to respond.
Graeme:
Always. Down the block from you in the back of my car. Why?
Borden:
Notice any strange activity?
Graeme:
Nothing from my end. I’m not in front of the apartment building. There were no spots available for parking. Want me to move?
Borden:
I want you to drive up the street and let me know if you see anything in the alleyway across the building from us.
Graeme:
And what happens if I see someone? Take him to dinner or drop him off at the park?
Borden paused before he answered, a fleeting round of scenarios running through his mind.
Borden:
You take him to dinner.
In other words: You apprehend the fucker and wait for Borden’s next instructions.
In other words: Borden was going to cut every inch of flesh off the fucker’s body.
In other words: Fucker was going to his death.
Borden slid out of bed and looked out the window. Moments later the black Mercedes slowly inched down the street, coming to a stop in front of the alleyway. It stayed like that for some time, and then Borden’s phone buzzed.
Graeme:
I don’t see anyone, but it’s too dark to be sure. Do you want me to get out and have a better look?
Borden:
Do it in a minute. I’ll be down there by then.
He grabbed his clothes and shoes and slipped them on. Then he went to the night table and grabbed the chain with Emma’s apartment key on it and hurried out, quietly locking the door behind him. It was unusually mute in the hallway as he made his way to the elevator. He took the elevator down and when he was out, the car was still stopped and Graeme was already standing outside the alleyway, peering in.
Borden approached him, and Graeme turned his head to look at him. “Nobody is here, Mr Borden. Empty. I’m certain of it.”
Ignoring him, Borden reached his hand out. “Gun.”
Graeme removed his gun out of the waistband of his pants and handed it to him. Borden turned the safety switch off and, without another word, he walked down the alleyway. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out his cell phone. He pressed a button, prompting the screen to light up, and used it like a flashlight, aiming it around him every step of the way.
Despite his gut feeling, the alleyway was completely empty. Borden gritted his teeth, stopping when he reached the end. He really was losing his shit after all. He could hardly believe it.
“What’s going on?” Graeme asked, approaching him quietly from behind. “Is there a threat?”
“I don’t know,” Borden answered uncertainly. “I can’t be sure if I’m being fucked with or…”
Or what?
Regardless, whoever was behind that message needed to be found and dealt with. He looked back at the text, reading it over and over again. Who the hell did this pussy think he was anyway? Without thinking, he angrily responded.
You’re wrong. I will find you, motherfucker, and I will tear you limb from limb.
He sent the message and turned back around. He took two steps before he heard a loud ping coming from nearby. He stopped abruptly and followed the sound. Catching
something from the corner of his eye, he glimpsed at the ground and saw something flash feet away from Graeme. Instantly, his senses were on alert.
“Get fucked,” he muttered to himself in disbelief.
Graeme followed his gaze and picked up the lit object from the ground, his own face screwed up. “I don’t understand.”
Borden took it from him and his stomach roiled at the screen he looked down at. A shitty ass cell phone that’d been ditched only recently judging by the full battery.
And one new text message sat in the inbox.
He pressed the message and stared down at his own words. He wasn’t being paranoid. Fucker had stood right here when he wrote the message, and that was what, thirty minutes ago? Adrenaline surged within him, and he exited the text and searched the inbox, looking for something else. Some kind of identity on the fucker. Instead, there was another text sitting in the inbox, and the title read, “BORDEN.” The edges of his vision went red as he pressed it and read the message that made every part of him burn.